Painful details of Blue Jays' Shohei Ohtani whiff almost make Dodgers fans pity them

Last year, when the Dodgers visited the Blue Jays in April, Shohei Ohtani was booed heartily by the Toronto faithful when he came up for his first at-bat ... and then he immediately hit a homer in what would turn into a 12-2 rout.

Fair enough to assume that Ohtani will play in front of a similarly irate crowd for the first two games of the World Series hosted in Toronto. Blue Jays fans may never get over the false advertising and subsequent debunking of Jon Morosi's infamous "Shohei Ohtani is on a plane to Toronto" tweet, as well as everything that went into their courting of Ohtani before he ultimately signed with the Dodgers.

Blue Jays manager John Schneider quipped ahead of Ohtani's Rogers Centre visit last year, "If anything, just tell him we want our Blue Jays hat back that he took with him after our meeting."

It was already public knowledge that Ohtani went as far as to tour spring training facilities in Dunedin, but Keegan Matheson of MLB.com had even more details that'll make even Dodgers fans cringe.

During his tour of those facilities, the Blue Jays filled a locker with personalized team goodies. Ohtani packed all of them up and took them with him. He even went as far as to dress his dog in a Canadian dog jacket they provided.

A week later, he announced his intention to sign with the Dodgers.

New details of Blue Jays' failed pursuit of Shohei Ohtani will make even Dodgers fans cringe

That is ... really tough. It's not unusual that a team would offer a star player some complimentary items in the courting process (the Yankees infamously gave Yoshinobu Yamamoto a No. 18 jersey when he visited), but it's not hard to imagine that the Blue Jays were incredibly heartened by the fact that Ohtani was seemingly so impressed that he took everything with him.

The Blue Jays also reportedly matched the $700 million offer Ohtani eventually took with the Dodgers. In that case, it had to have come down to a matter of personal preference, and that makes it all even more brutal.

Clearly, Toronto has fared just fine without Ohtani, and not getting him was a driving force in giving that $500 million extension to Vladimir Guerrero Jr. Still, the Ohtani wound is one that might never fully heal over for Blue Jays fans, especially not if he breaks their hearts again in the World Series.